ALAN POWER: Hello and welcome to the National Trust podcast.

In these mini episodes we're going behind the scenes and

meeting the people behind the places.

In this episode we're meeting Josh Turner a ranger at Cliveden

to learn a little bit more about the bird life in the garden.

JOSH TURNER: So at the moment, we're standing at the pond at

the top of the Rushy Valley, which is a hay meadow, full of

wildflowers and different sorts of insects and invertebrates.

So we've got all sorts of different wildlife here. Our

main types of Birds Of Prey are Buzzards and red kites, but we

also have nesting Barn Owls here, also quite big on garden

birds.

So we occasionally see Bullfinches, Long Tailed Tits

and Chaffinches flying around the estate.

Here at Cliveden during the morning, especially when no

one's here and we're close to the estate. There's some

fantastic range of bird song which is beautiful to hear.

We're lucky enough to hear the Mistle Thrush in the morning.

It's usually sits on top of the Oak and Beech trees, sing its

heart out and really does belt out a song first thing in the

morning.

My favourite bird is the Kingfisher. Because it's a

fantastic colour. It's, it's amazing at fishing and, you

know, when you see it darting across the river you see a, a

flash of blue. Yeah, it's quite fantastic.

Birdsong of the Blackbirds. It's quite distinctive. And if you

want to get into birding, it's probably one of the easiest

birds to, to get to know.

It's not quite a timid bird. So you can actually sit down and

look at it for quite a while and you can get to recognize the

different calls and songs it makes.

So we have an army of parakeets here at Cliveden. They are

everywhere in the woodlands.

They're quite big birds, probably slightly larger than a

Magpie. Got very long tail and they are completely green

throughout with a red beak.

They congregate together. Yeah, make a real racket. They are not

native to the UK, but there isn't any research suggesting

that they're having any implications on native birds

just yet.

So, yeah, I think, coming behind us as a Chaffinch peeping away.

Yeah, and again, very pretty pretty birds.

Male has a, a red breast and a blue head to it. It's quite

distinctive. The female is slightly duller, slightly

browner in colour, but nevertheless, still a pretty

bird.

If you, if you've got a garden at home, I'd suggest looking out

for the Goldfinches.

They are really, really common now, which is a fantastic sight

to see. They are a beautiful bird. It's, they've got a

gorgeous red face and gold and black feathers. I suggest also

putting out some Niger Seeds in the garden and then you'll have

clump them coming to you. They usually travel around pairs. So

if you watch out for that.

So here at Cliveden, we run a, a family camping event and part of

our responsibilities of that was to- set up a moth trap.

So me and Lead Ranger Tim, we went out and set that out. But,

as we were coming back, we heard this absolute racket.

We were quite frightened because it was, it was pitch black and

we didn't know what was going on.

And, we came under this tree and there were these two massive

Barn Owls and they looked absolutely stunning and they

were just feeding, probably hunting for their young.

I didn't actually quite see their young, but you could see

them sweeping down and, and picking up all the different

mice and voles around the estate. And yeah, that was

probably, that's probably my highlight, wildlife highlight of

working here so far was seeing those two Barn Owls and that's

probably something that will stay with me forever.

ALAN POWER: Thanks for listening to this week's National Trust

mini episode for our next full episode. I'll be in stow

exploring the hidden meanings of the incredible landscape gardens

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